Monday, June 10, 2013

Feeddler status update

Long story short: I will submit a Feeddler update soon that should transition well into the post-Google Reader era.

No, it's not Feedly or Digg. Their API is not ready yet. I am aware of Feedly's announcement last week and I did get its API access after the news. But Feedly folks are still working day and night to fix bugs. Their API is also different from Google's, so it will take me some time for integration.

Feeddler will first support BazQux Reader which nicely duplicates Google Reader API. In the past few days, its developer even implemented a few advanced API methods that are only used by Feeddler (e.g. drag-and-drop sorting and feed pagination) after my requests. BazQux Reader is the only one I have seen that supports full set of Google Reader API, which means Feeddler users will not miss any major functionality. It has a very usable web interface too. BazQux Reader offers a 30-day free trial and charges a $2/month subscription fee.

Not ready to commit to a subscription service? Feeddler will support Feedly later, but you might lose some functionality due to API changes.

How about Feeddler's own solution? I have completed the code for RSS aggregation and successfully tested hundred of feeds in several languages. But I still need to work on cross-plateform syncing. No subscription fee, but likely a separate app. Some non-technical issues have prevented me from spending time in this new development. I cannot promise when I will release it. Hopefully soon.

So, how much of the $2/month fee for BazQux do you receive as a commission for providing a pay only solution to an app I have already paid to download from the App Store?

Sorry, but as a pro version purchaser, I expect to not be charged over and above that original purchase price for access to the basic advertised functionality of the app.

Instead of spending the last 6 months trying to find a site that would offer you commission for all the users this app will bring to them, perhaps you should have been doing sone code work to make Feeddler work with the many free solutions that were suggested in the previous blog comments - there were certainly no shortage of suggestions, both self-hosted and ore-existing services.

For the record, I love the app - that's why I paid for it. I don't have hundreds of feeds (less than 12 in fact) so don't care about feed limits from free hosted solutions.I do care about getting what I paid for - a functional app. Not a peice of software rendered useless until I pay a monthly fee.

Thank you for your efforts. I have over 300 feeds that I follow regularly so your solution will be well-used. I don't like Feedly's interface. Yours is still the best one available...and I've tried them all.

Hi,I have been using feedler in the free version for the last two years. I have been a google Reader User Long before, and when I got my first iPhone, feedler was just the app that I was looking for. I have tried some others, but none suited my needs just like feedler.

If I was asked, I would prefer a free solution, but as google closes down google reader I am more than willing to pay some money for this service.

Everyone who complains that you should have spent more time to "just Code your own Hosting solution" should think again. It's not just the Code, this solution also has to be hosted somewhere. And with the User base of feedler this is probably not fulfilled with some Virtual Server for 20$ per month, I would guess that we would be talking about several dozen servers and the infrastructure around them, like firewalls, load balancers, storage, traffic cost,... Not Even thinking about the time needed to administrate such a service (yes, I know a Little Bit what I am talking about)

Google was ablel to handle this for free (at least Not taking money for it), but no one can ask you to do the same thing from your personal money and time.

I am very happy that you found a solution that allows me to stay with the same app and interface I have loved for the past two years. 24 $ per year is definitely worth it. (And as a side note: I am pretty sure you either don't get any money at all from Bazqux or the amount is somewhere around 10% of what the end User pays. At least that is usually what you get as a partner/reseller. Once again, I know a Little Bit of what I am Talking about. I earn my money with these kinds of Deals...)

It comes down to trust, to me. When I purchased FeeddlerPro I trusted the app creator that it would be maintained and implicitly google that it will continue to provide the service, as it turned out, the latter trust was misplaced. So would I sign up for a subscription service provided by an even less established name (while there are adequate free alternatives)? You may have guessed it: no. This is why I think supporting self hosting would be great. If there was a subscription only option, I would certainly abandon the app. Just my 2 c.

We are all a little put out by having to pay for something Google used to provide for free, but as Michael said, feed syncing is a complicated business, and though Google made it appear to be "free," obviously there were costs to providing the service or they wouldn't be dropping it. (I still haven't figured out why they didn't just charge for it, but maybe it's because they knew they'd get accused of being evil.)

$2 a month is fair for this kind of functionality. I don't need to sync between devices, though, because I do all my feed reading on my iPad. So a standalone aggregator app would be awesome.

Thanks for all the work you put into this. It's a great app with an easy-to-read interface.

Great to hear about Feedly support. I'm planning on using Feedly going forward when Google Reader expires but of course would be happier to stick with the familiar interface of Feeddler. I'm not sold on Bazqux at the moment as such small operations could be overwhelmed by demand and not give a robust service.

Thanks for deciding to support the feedly backend eventually. I hope it is sooner than later. To the people complaining about paying for another service, maybe you can take my approach and use the feedly reader in the meantime. I'll miss using Feeddler Pro until then.

I love the simplicity of Feedler and Google Reader. If it were possible...I would love a web based version of Feedler. Since I use multiple devices, I have migrated to Feedly. But there are functions of Feedler that I prefer and use everyday - such as flagging and emailing articles.

I agree that I would have happily paid a fee for Google Reader for the simplicity, integration, and syncing.

It upsets me that Google has forced us down this path but I would like to see other free alternatives to Google Reader. There are many popping up and one that I have identified is Red Tree Reader: http://www.redtreereader.com/ Please look into one of these other free sites for support in the Feeddler App and I have the paid version of Feeddler I liked it so much. I love your application but I loved it because Google had a free back end. Please find an alternative that has no cost for that back end feed.